We all know that poor web designs can be detrimental for a businesses. If a website looks unprofessional or the design looks unattractive, visitors will simply click the ‘x’ on their browser and take their business elsewhere.
Even if your web design is great, there could potentially be a few mistakes you are making that are costing your business sales. Here we have shared some of the most common web design mistakes and easy fixes so you can avoid making them yourself.
Complicated Navigation
When users land on your business website, they expect to be able to locate the information they need quickly and efficiently. What they do not expect is to have to navigate through a number of different pages in order to find the answers to their queries. If visitors almost have to read a manual guide in order to use your website’s navigation, then it will most certainly be costing your business sales.
The easy way to solve this is to strip back your web design and simplify its navigational elements. Ensure there is a banner at the top of each page which links to your main pages and create a search box where users can input keywords to locate the information they need even faster. If your pages are particularly long, you may want to also think about fixing the navigation bar to the web design, so that when users scroll down the page, the navigation bar scrolls with them.
The easier you make it for users to navigate your website, the more likely they are to buy your products or services and re-visit in the future.
Broken Website Links
If your web design is full of broken links it is going to make your business website look out-dated, unmaintained and unprofessional. If you are too lazy to keep your website updated, customers will wonder whether they can really rely on you to deliver the level of service they require.
This problem can simply be solved by auditing your website for broken links. There are also a number of tools you can use to make this process quicker. Once you have identified broken links, fix them so they point to the right page or if they have nowhere to go, remove them.
Poor Quality Images and Stock Photos
Images play an important role in web designs and user experience, so it’s quite surprising that many businesses still choose to feature low quality images on their websites. No matter how great your web design is, if you use low quality images, your website will look unprofessional.
Another small mistake that businesses make is using stock photos. Whilst you could say there is nothing wrong with buying stock photos to use, the problem is that hundreds of other businesses use them too. Using stock photos will not make your business stand or do anything positive for your branding. Taking photos for your website isn’t hard and most web designers will be able to recommend the sort of photos you need to feature.
Boring, Old Content
It is not worth spending hundreds or even thousands of pounds on a new web design, if you are not going to bother filling your website with interesting, relevant and engaging content. Whilst having a beautiful looking website is sure to attract users, it is your content that is going to keep them on your website.
Instead of leaving your website looking pretty bare or using out-dated content, why not spend a day or two writing new content for your website? If you are in the process of re-designing your website, you will need to work closely with your web designer on presenting your content in an easy-to-read format.
When it comes to designing a website, the content is equally as important as the design, so do not sacrifice one for the other.